- Alrighty, so I saw this weeks ago. I'm writing this on Halloween, entirely from notes and memory. In fact, I may just list the notes I took during the performance as they are.
- I loved the detail of the set that I could see as I entered, which is a typical perk of the Brooklyn College performances. I'm a big fan of house music that sets the tone and period of a play, and Fiona Apple's "Criminal" wasn't lost on me.
- 'Adult Entertainment' was the first of two plays making up 'Suburban Motel,' like a 'Plaza Suite' mixed with a Denzel Washington crooked cop thriller. It opens with a semi-realistic sex scene. It was pretty convincing except that Jonny Maldonado as Max was fully clothed. Director Mary Beth Easley added wonderful touches of detail, such as Andrea Aranguren putting her underwear back on, but if she was supposedly panty-less during sex, shouldn't all participants be? I wouldn't make a big deal of this minor point if it were not for the other hyper-real effects like the sound of Max pissing in the bathroom and then flushing. I think this underwear situation is a double standard, and I also think Mr. Maldonado wasn't comfortable, even with clothes on, which leads me to my next point.
- Jonny Maldonado was pretty fantastic in 'Marisol' in the spring. He brought life and dimension to a very bizarre and frightening character. This time, given a pretty straightforward character, he seemed out of sync with the rest of the ensemble of 'Adult Entertainment,' and he certainly flattened his lines and missed emphases. I have to mention that I saw the evening performance of a 2-performance day, but I shouldn't be able to notice an actor's fatigue. It stood out tremendously right from the beginning, a hot and bothered motel sex scene. When Aranguren loses interest, Maldonado had a line, "I'm still worked up here, can't you see I'm still worked up?" I may not have a penis, but I'm pretty sure that's what the line is about, and Maldonado was too scared to allude to masculine physical excitement. Or Easley told him not to, I don't know. But it was super flat, and all of the rest of his lines were flat, too. Aranguren was in a constant state of compensation to balance the dying energy.
- Thankfully, Jeremy Ping as Donny and Sarah Poleshuck as Pam enter the play and revive the flat atmosphere. Their dynamic together was excellent, believable, and refreshing. Poleshuck evoked Maggie Gyllenhaal's 'Sherrybaby' pretty flawlessly.
- The set was wildly specific, as usual, but I felt a little disappointed in the costumes of 'Adult Entertainment.' They didn't feel 90s enough, which was the setting according to the program. Even though it was late 90s, I could have expected some shoulder pads in Aranguren's lawyer powersuit, or at least sharper lines. The blazer should have been a little oversized instead of perfectly fitted. Ping's track suit could have been a more hideous color combination.
- The play itself, by George F. Walker, had some strange and gratuitous moments, like a dream sequence and a rape scene (which felt really long, even though Ping and Poleshuck nailed this really difficult situation, I'm sure thanks to Easley.)
- 'Adult Entertainment' was unmemorable overall, except for Poleshuck's retching in the functional bathroom.
- The violence felt tired and half-hearted.
- Great blood make-up.
- Way too many bits of business. Actors were *constantly* playing with properties, changing clothes, and Maldonado was putting his gun holster on for eternity.
- The cell phone was too modern.
- Actors missed live in-the-moment opportunities. Poleshuck knocked a loaded gun off a table, and responded with a "woah" which almost worked, but I think could have been bigger. The scene just kept going. I respect when actors don't plow through material when something as brilliant as a gun falling to the ground happenes. Fear? Time limit of the piece? Actors, like critics, are observers.
- Moving on, to 'Featuring Loretta.' I loved the touch of the maid cleaning the set during the intermission. Lovely way to connect two very different plays. Brava Ms. Easley on that! And Keelie Sheridan (Loretta) on stage before the house goes down, also a great bridge.
- This play has a very different tone than its predecessor. The comedy was big, but not overdone.
- The costumes were much more 90s in this act. I wondered why, and I just saw in the program that each play had a different costume designer. No wonder. Nikki Cammack on 'Adult Entertainment' missed the mark, but Angelica Borrero struck gold on 'Featuring Loretta'!
- Great use of space and physicality.
- At first, I felt dashing hunk Aaron Mednick was miscast as the creepy dweeb Dave, but I grew to see him as a Christopher Reeve/Clark Kent.
- Keelie Sheridan is the master of staged phone conversations and big hair.
- I know some of the actors worried about being able to write their theses on this episodic production, but these characters had so much juice -- especially the characters of 'Loretta,' maybe even too much. As the Russian Winona Ryder type, Fiona Criddle (Sophie), tells us, "People kill themselves from this too much information. The pressure squish down on their heads."
- I thought the night clearly belonged to the women, but then Patrick McCormick brought an adorable charm to his sleazy character, Michael. It was hard to dislike him or the dangerous sociopath almost-boyfriend, Mednick, because Sheridan's portrayal of Loretta was a woman very much in control of her circumstances.
- I think that because of her predicament, her character could be played with far less business-like determination, but that clarity of purpose (or ambiguity, as the Russian girl, Sophie, suggests) sold it for me.
- I loved the details in 'Loretta,' such as Sheridan stuffing her stuffed animal into a drawer so as not to witness the less-than-dignified sex scene the character was about to partake in.
- When leaving the theatre, I could really see the fantastic detail of the set, the bits of crap behind the bed's headboard: watches, candy wrappers, and other motel detritus. Props to set designer, Scott Mancha on that kind of insight.
- So, all around, 'Suburban Motel' was weird, gangly, and awkward like its own character, Michael (McCormick), kind of creepy like Dave (Mednick), flabby and tired like Max (Maldonado), but also at moments sharp like Sophie (Criddle), specific like Jayne (Aranguren) and Pam (Poleshuck), and surprisingly complex like Donny (Ping) and Loretta (Sheridan).
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Cole
Trans man, Playwright, Dramaturg, and Theatre & Dance Historian Archives
August 2014
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